1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a packaging system for shipping and storing poultry trusses. More particularly, the present invention relates to a storage tray for retaining several poultry trusses in an organized arrangement.
2. Background of the Invention
When preparing poultry for the market, the legs of the eviscerated bird are generally folded against the body and retained in place by a poultry truss such as the wire trussing device shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,293,977, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference. In general, the wire trussing device includes a central U-shaped portion, outward extending shoulders and a pair of legs depending from the shoulders. The disclosed poultry device engages the hocks of the poultry legs and securely trusses the legs against the body and across the rear opening of the bird. Advanced processing techniques have been developed to more quickly process the poultry. Providing a worker with convenient access to a supply of poultry trusses further improves the efficiency of poultry processing systems. Storing poultry trusses in an orderly arrangement within the convenient reach of the worker minimizes the time required for a worker to pick up a handful of trusses from the tray.
One type of storage cartridge available in the art is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,518,083. The disclosed cartridge includes a V-shaped section bordered by a pair of longitudinally extending ridges or corners. The V-shaped section is formed so that the truss may be positioned with the shoulders of the truss supported by the longitudinally extending ridges and the U-shaped portion positioned in the V-shaped section of the cartridge.
A storage tray which may be arranged in a stack with adjacent trays being spaced apart when the trays are filled with poultry trusses allows a worker to quickly pick up the top tray and remove it from the stack. While separating the trays is desirable when the trays are full, this stacking arrangement is of minimal advantage for empty trays. A storage tray which may also be stacked in a nested arrangement when the trays are empty minimizes the space occupied by the trays as well as the costs of shipping the empty trays.
Accordingly, a primary object of the present invention is to provide a tray for efficiently retaining a plurality of poultry trusses in an organized arrangement.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a tray for poultry trusses which retains the trusses in a substantially uniform, parallel arrangement.
A still further object of the invention is to provide means to prevent disarray of the trusses in an underlying tray when a superimposed tray is lifted.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a tray for poultry trusses which may be arranged in a stack with the tray spaced above a second tray when the second tray is filled with trusses.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide such a tray for poultry trusses which may also be positioned in a stack with the tray nested in the second tray when the second tray is empty.
A more general object of the present invention is to provide a tray for poultry trusses which may be efficiently and inexpensively manufactured, which may be molded of an inexpensive plastic, and which holds a considerable quantity of poultry trusses.